Free Songs of Love & Death by George R. R. Martin, Gardner Dozois

hidden in a wall are revealed when someone is inspired to break it down.”
    “I have heard of such cases,” Anne Darby declared, wide-eyed.
    “It’s only a legend, Mother.”
    That caused Loxsleigh to look at her again. “You doubt, Miss Darby, and therein lies the problem. Once, the fey folk lived close to humans, dwelling in the dense woodlands that surrounded every village and manor, interacting with people according to their whim. But much of that woodland has been cut down and the land put to agriculture, and modern thought has made skeptics of us all. Nowadays faery lives among us only in their mystic havens. To continue the work, Titania made Sir Robert her deputy, enabling him to find lost gold and put it to use to benefit the poor.”
    “Then why,” Martha asked, “are his descendants so rich?”
    “Martha!” her mother protested.
    But Loxsleigh smiled. As if she’d opened a door.
    “Queen Titania wished Sir Robert to found a line that would continue this work, so she bound him with rules. He must keep a seventh of the value of any trove and use it for his own health and prosperity. He must marry and sire children, so that an eldest son would carry on the work, and so must his heirs for all time. Those with the talent must do the work. If he or his descendants broke these rules there was a penalty—they would die within the year. Not just the trouvedor, for thus the gold finders are called, but all Robert’s descendants to that day.”
    “Over five hundred years?” Anne Darby exclaimed. “That could be a vast number!”
    “Faery is not benign, ma’am. We are as moths to them, dead in a moment.”
    And that rang deadly true. Martha desperately tried to make sense of this, but she remembered him saying that if she did not marry him, he would die. He could
not
be claiming that this story was true, that he possessed a fairy gift!
    “Those are easy enough conditions, Mr. Loxsleigh,” Martha said with deliberate flippancy. “To live a comfortable life and marry.”
    “Martha,” her mother said again, becoming distressed.
    Loxsleigh still smiled, but Martha was more and more aware of dark tension all around him. “As you say, Miss Darby. Except that Oberon does his best to thwart his queen.”
    The coach lurched into an inn then for a change of horses, breaking the moment. Almost breaking a spell.
    Was that it? Was she under a spell? Was that why she’d agreed to this mad journey?
    But that would mean it was all true. Fairies. Gold finders.
    He climbed down to inspect the new horses and pay the fees. She watched him, remembering the earring. His bright burning exultation. Him sweeping her up in that mad whirl. A predictor of this mad whirl. But she’d been alive then. Alive as never before.
    No, she would have none of this. She was a rational Christian woman. The man was mad, and she could only pray he wasn’t dangerously so.
    He climbed back in and the coach moved on.
    Martha’s mother said, “You mentioned Oberon, sir. Do tell us more.”
    Martha saw that he wanted to tell her, intended to tell her, and could do nothing to prevent it.
    “You will remember that Oberon had reason to hate Robert Loxsleigh, but by faery law he could not deny his lady’s gifts. Titania had already imposed rules and a dreadful consequence, however, so he set out to make obedience difficult. He decreed that Robert Loxsleigh and his heirs would not achieve their talent until they married, and that they must marry a woman that he would choose, and before their twenty-fifth birthday.
    “Titania insisted that the woman must be healthy, and of a suitable age and station, but she and her husband enjoy their battles, so she made no more attempt than that. Thus—if we are to believe my family lore—there will always be a destined bride for the Loxsleigh heir, but Oberon will make her hard to find.” He turned to Martha. “When found, however, there will be no doubt. On either side. We call the bride his marrying